Comparative Study of the Findings of the First Complete Blood Cell Count in Determining the Outcome of Patients with Covid-19: A Cross-Sectional Study

The risk factors for the death of covid-19 patients are not fully identified, and an accurate and robust risk assessment tool is needed to assess the prognosis of patients that is easy and affordable to implement. The purpose of this study was to compare the findings of the first Complete Blood Count in patients diagnosed with Covid-19 who were discharged with a favorable general condition, compared to those who died in the hospital.

This cross-sectional study was performed on 213 patients with a definite diagnosis of covid-19. The findings of the first CBC were compared to estimate the survival of discharged and deceased patients. Data were analyzed by using Medcalc.20.013 software .

The frequency of death was 35.2%. The increase of White Blood Cells in predicting death had a poor diagnosis (Receiver Operating Characteristic = 0.66). Hemoglobin decreases in predicting death had no diagnostic power (ROC=0.58). Platelet augmentation was not effective. The increase in Mean Corpuscular Volume had poor diagnostic power (ROC=0.60), but the decrease in lymphocytes in predicting death had good diagnostic power (ROC=0.70). An increase in Neutrophil-Lymphocyte Ratio in predicting death had good diagnostic power (ROC=0.70). The increased platelet-lymphocyte ratio in predicting death had poor diagnostic power (ROC=0.67). The increase in Systemic Immune-Inflammation Index in predicting death had poor diagnostic power (ROC=0.68).

The results of this study showed that based on the first findings of the CBC test, three factors for predicting the risk of death, increased neutrophils, decreased lymphocytes, and increased Neutrophil-Lymphocyte Ratio were identified with good diagnostic power, which indicates the diagnosticity of this test in predicting the tensity and survival of covid-19 patients.